Since some time in the summer last year, I have often filled in idle moments with a sudoku puzzle. Though one might contend that they are simply crosswords for the illiterate and unimaginative, I relish a sudoku when I have some time to pass. In fact, give me a fully-charged iPod and a book of sudokus, and I would probably never get bored. At least until the charge ran out on the iPod.

On my return to Glasgow today, I noticed that a little bit of my childhood had died. My walk from Cathcart station to my parents’ house takes me past the Beechings pub on Clarkston Road. Every time I used to pass it, rounding the corner onto Monreith Road East, I used to stop and breathe in a pleasantly familiar smell, which was peculiarly evocative of getting my hair cut at the local barber’s shop when I was younger.

I passed today for the first time in over a month: the smell was gone. I paused, considered this for a moment, [formulated a catchy title for a blog post,] and carried on.